Catherine had been playing softly on the piano, and now she sat at the window, gazing over the darkening sea with eyes that obviously saw nothing. She did not know that her aunt’s keen glance was fixed upon her face, and suddenly she gave a little sigh. “What are you thinking of, my dear?” said the old lady. Catherine crimsoned, for, to tell the truth, she had been reviewing for the thousandth time that episode on the mountain-side. She hesitated, and then answered— “Oh, about a great many things.” “Catherine,” asked her aunt again, “have you ever had a lover?” “Oh, what makes you ask?” said the girl, swift waves of colour chasing each other from her white forehead to her slender neck. “That means, I suppose, that you have. I thought that sigh could not be for nothing.” “No, indeed,” stammered the girl, “really I haven’t—at least, I suppose—I don’t think——” “My dear, I am sure there is somebody. You must not think me very prying and inquisitive, but I insist on knowing the particulars.” Catherine grew indignant. “You have no right; and besides, there is nothing to tell.” “Pardon me, I have a right,” said her aunt. “Do you not understand that I have left all my property to you, that you will be a very rich woman, and that I have some interest in knowing on whom the responsibility of the management will devolve? Come, my dear, imagine that I am your mother, and that no one cares more for your happiness than I. Did it happen in Switzerland?” And so at last, by dint of many questions and suggestions, she drew out Catherine’s little story. “Well, my dear,” she said, when it was finished, and Catherine’s shoulders were shaking in a storm of sobs on her lap, “I must say that I think you have behaved very foolishly, although I appreciate your motives. You should at least have given him the opportunity of a definite declaration.” “But I don’t believe that he really cares; it was only a momentary impulse, perhaps, and besides, how could I help him? And Margaret, at any rate, suspected that he cared for someone else.” “But his letter afterwards—you say he was a gentleman?” “Of course!” cried Catherine, indignant at the insinuation. “Then it is most probable that he was in earnest. How absurd girls are! To risk the happiness of your whole life for a sentimental idea! Now what you must do, and at once, is to write to his sister, and enclose your address.” “Aunt Cicely!” exclaimed Catherine angrily. “Yes, why not?” “Don’t you see that it would undo all that I have already accomplished? He would be sure to hear, and it would be like asking him to come to me!” “And what of that? He would probably be only too glad. And remember that you are a better match now. If he cared for you when you were a little insignificant governess, without any connexions as far as he knew, he would care much more now you are my acknowledged heiress.”